YANGON: The UN Human Rights envoy to Myanmar, Yanghee Lee, says the country's government will lose credibility if it continues to defend the reported human rights abuses against Rohingya Muslims.
Speaking at a news briefing held in Yangon at the end of her 12-day visit to the country, Lee said the Myanmar government led by Nobel peace laureate Aung San Suu Kyi would "appear less and less credible" if it continues being defensive in response to allegations of persistently reported serious human rights violations.
Lee arrived in Myanmar on Jan 8 to assess the recent developments in the human rights situation in the country, especially in conflict-riddled Rakhine State. Human rights abuses by security forces were reported there as the military conducts "clearance operations" following coordinated attacks by hundreds of Muslims in the area on border guard outposts that left nine police officers dead.
It was the fifth visit by the 60-year-old South Korean university professor since she became "special rapporteur on the human rights situation in Myanmar" in 2014.
Lee toured Maungdaw in northern Rakhine state for four days, visiting the villages and sites of attacks and human rights abuses and meeting representatives of the Muslim community who calls themselves Rohingya as well as government officials and senior police officials to gather facts for her report, to be submitted to the UN Human Rights Council in March 2017.
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